Portland is thirty minutes from everything.
Waterfalls east, ocean west, a volcano out the window and dinner from a cart. Every tour that runs out of this city, priced, timed and ranked by the people who took it.
The Columbia River Gorge decides your first day in Portland.
All Gorge trips →
Thirty minutes east of downtown the Columbia cuts a mile-wide trench through the Cascades and drops a dozen waterfalls into it. Three trips carry most of the traffic. They differ mainly on how much walking you do and whether Mount Hood is on the itinerary.
Multnomah Falls on foot, not from the car park
Latourell, Bridal Veil, Wahkeena and Multnomah with real trail time between them. You come back muddy, which is the point.
Six waterfalls, a van, no hiking required
The classic waterfall corridor with short walks to each viewpoint. The pick if the Gorge is one stop in a packed week.
Gorge in the morning, Mount Hood after lunch
Waterfalls first, then up the mountain loop to Timberline and back through the orchards and cider houses of Hood River.
What a day out of Portland actually costs.
Every tour on the site sorted by price. Oregon charges no sales tax, so the number you see is the number you pay.
Ghost walks, donut crawls, self-guided hunts and the odd garden ticket. Half a day on cash-in-pocket money.
The core of the catalogue: waterfall half-days, food walks, brewery rides, lunch cruises on the Willamette.
Coast days, Willamette wine with lunch, air tours over Hood, private drivers with a whole day to spend.
The six days Portland trips get built around.
Waterfalls, the mountain, the ocean, the carts, the wine and the tunnels under Old Town. Almost every itinerary here is some combination of those six.
The Portland tours with the longest queues.
Every review →Ordered by how many travellers have actually been and left a rating. The waterfalls dominate, and there is a reason for that.
1
Multnomah Falls and Columbia River Gorge Half-Day Hiking Tour
Guided half-day Columbia Gorge waterfall hikes from Portland, with Multnomah Falls, Latourell, Bridal Veil, Vista House, and expert local storytelling.
From · $73
Read our review →2
Columbia River Gorge Waterfalls Tour from Portland, OR
from $89
3
Multnomah Falls and Columbia River Gorge Waterfalls Tour Morning
from $85
4
Full-Day Guided Oregon Coast Tour from Portland
from $139
5
Mt Hood Day Trip from Portland to Multnomah Falls and Hood River
from $133
6
Columbia River Gorge Waterfalls & Mt Hood Tour from Portland, OR
from $149
7
Portland’s Original Delicious Donut Adventure & Walking Food Tour
from $69
8
Willamette Valley Wine Tour with Lunch
from $210
9
2.5-hour Dinner Cruise on Willamette River
from $129
Portland eats standing up, out of a window, in the rain.
The cart pods, the donut counters, the coffee roasters and the brewery taps are the closest thing this city has to a monument. A food tour here matters less for the food than for being walked to the six places you would never have found.
Two volcanoes are visible from Portland. One of them blew up.
Hood stands 11,249 ft due east and holds snow into August. Fifty miles north, Mount St Helens still carries the crater it opened on 18 May 1980. Both are day trips from the same hotel, and an air tour makes a short morning of either.
The Pacific is ninety minutes from the Portland city limits.
Cannon Beach and its 235-foot sea stack, the dairy country behind Tillamook, the headlands at Ecola. Closer in, the Willamette runs straight through downtown and the boats leave from the seawall - lunch cruises at walking pace, jet boats at the other extreme.
- 1Full-Day Guided Oregon Coast Tour from Portlandfrom $139
- 22.5-hour Dinner Cruise on Willamette Riverfrom $129
- 3Oregon Coast Day Trip: Cannon Beach and Haystack Rockfrom $140
Three things that only happen in this corner of Oregon.
Waterfalls and wine country exist elsewhere. The tunnels, the cart pods and the Dundee Hills do not.
The Shanghai Tunnels
Beneath Old Town runs a network of brick passages that once linked basements to the waterfront. What they were really used for is still argued about, and the good guides say so out loud. The tours go down with torches, and several finish in a brewery, which tells you how seriously the city takes its own ghost stories.
- 1Haunted Underground Shanghai Tunnel Tour with Brewery Tastings★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 405 reviews
- 2Phantoms, Penance, and Poltergeists: Portland Ghost Tour★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 328 reviews
- 3Ghosts, Poltergeists, and Psychopaths Walking Tour★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 197 reviews
The Cart Pod
Portland parked its food carts in fixed lots, gave them power and seating and called them pods. Whole blocks run on the arrangement. Nothing takes a reservation, everything takes twenty minutes, and a guide is worth the money purely to stop you filling up on the first window you see.
- 1Portland’s Original Delicious Donut Adventure & Walking Food Tour★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 533 reviews
- 2Portland Downtown Food Tour: 6 Tastings of Local & Global Flavors★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 201 reviews
- 3All-Inclusive Downtown Portland Food Tour★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 181 reviews
Dundee Hills Pinot
The Willamette Valley grows pinot noir on volcanic soil at roughly the latitude of Burgundy, and the tasting rooms are small enough that most of them want you booked in. That is the real argument for a tour: somebody else drives the switchbacks between estates while you keep tasting.
- 1Willamette Valley Wine Tour with Lunch★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 503 reviews
- 2Willamette Valley Wine Tour from Portland★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 201 reviews
- 3Willamette Valley Wine Tasting Tour from Portland★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 89 reviews
The Portland days that will not wait for a walk-up.
Most of this city can be sorted the night before from your hotel. These cannot. They run on summer permits, small tasting rooms and boats that go out once a day.
- 01Multnomah Falls and Columbia River Gorge Half-Day Hiking TourThe falls area runs on timed-entry permits through high summer. A booked trip turns up with that already handled.
- 02Willamette Valley Wine Tour with LunchValley tasting rooms are small and mostly by appointment; the good Saturday slots go weeks out.
- 03Full-Day Guided Oregon Coast Tour from PortlandOne departure a day and ninety minutes each way. Miss it and the coast becomes a separate trip.
- 047 Wonders of the Gorge Jetboat CruiseSeasonal river running on a fixed daily schedule, in a boat that fills.
Portland is wet from November to May and carries on regardless.
Locals famously refuse to own umbrellas and the tours do not cancel. Rain is exactly when the tunnels under Old Town, the covered cart pods, the valley tasting rooms and the taprooms earn their place - and the waterfalls, honestly, run harder.
By where it goes
The Columbia River Gorge35 tours
Multnomah Falls21 tours
Mount Hood13 tours
The Oregon Coast11 tours
Willamette Valley16 tours
Mount St Helens4 tours
Downtown Portland12 tours- Everything we have written up →
The newest Portland tour reviews.
All recent →
Willamette Valley Pinot Noir & Wood Fired Pizza Pairing Tour
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Morning Multnomah Falls and Gorge Waterfalls Tour
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Smartphone-Guided Walking Tour of Downtown Portland
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Bed and Breakfast Wine Tour – Small Group, Joinable/Sharable
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Afternoon Multnomah Falls and Gorge Waterfalls Tour
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Custom Willamette Valley Wine Tours from The Allison Inn and Spa
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Portland Pizza Tour: 4 Full Slices at Top Local Pizzerias
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Private Willamette Valley Wine Tour from Portland (All tasting fees included)
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Multnomah Falls & Portland Premium Air Tour by Envi Adventures
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Coffee Roasters of Portland Eastside Walking Tour
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Rolls-Royce & Bentley Chauffeured All-inclusive Wine Tasting Tour
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Willamette Valley Wine Tour – For Private Groups
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